Bankers accuse media of creating hype for PSL tickets' sales

Bankers at the Bank of Punjab (BoP) have criticised media for creating hype of Pakistan Super League (PSL) final without inquiring about the number of tickets received by the Bank. One branch manager, requesting anonymity, told this scribe that he had received 35 tickets of Rs 500, another 35 of Rs 4000, 100 of Rs 8000 and 50 of Rs 12000.
"Media was making hue and cry about the sale of all tickets without informing the people about the exact state of tickets with bank branches," he added. He said the media has made mockery of people by projecting hype of the sale of tickets and they kept staying in long queues simply to grab camera attention.
Another banker said he had turned down some 132 calls by his friends throughout Wednesday, the very first day when sale of tickets started at 15 branches of the BoP. Total number of tickets with the bank was not more than 5000, he added. "We had no option but to drop the shutters of the bank by 12 pm in order to avoid public pressure oozing out of media hype," he added.
When asked about the bank strategy on tickets sale, one top management staffer of the bank said we had strategize to offer four tickets on each identity card of any value. However, he agreed with the fact that the branches were expecting much more tickets then what the PSL management had offered them to sale. "Each branch was expecting at least 3000 tickets of different denominations but what in actual they got was not more than 250," he pointed out.
Therefore, we changed our strategy and staff at the branches offered one ticket on each identity card to avoid sale of tickets in black market. Still, the demand for Rs 500 ticket was yet on peak and the youngsters were adamant to break in. Most of the bank branches therefore called police in emergency to provide them protection. Rangers were also deployed at some branches to control public.
"We had pulled out shutters down by midday to avoid public pressure," said one banker, adding that the professional sellers of new currency notes were quite active to grab tickets of minor value. However, majority of the bank branches have taken it as a best marketing opportunity and kept favouring their corporate clients throughout Thursday. One bank manager told that he is left with good amount of tickets of Rs 8000 and Rs 12000, which is being offered to the corporate clients to get business from them in future.